Monday, April 5, 2010

Todd's 1984 Fuji Touring Series IV

Here are some more pics of my recently built up series IV. I checked out your blog a bunch while trying to figure out what I wanted to do with this bike.

Your bikes are amazingly beautiful!

Todd"

Todd,

Thanks for your kind remarks. But I'd be quite happy were I able to achieve what you have with this beauty. You've pulled off the rather difficult trick of combining modern and classic parts in a very integrated fashion. Were I a bicycle manufacturer, I'd be taking a long, hard look at your work here and thinking about producing something that looked like this - it is really very well done.

Your work is one of the more novel and attractive custom Fujis to show up on these pages.

As an aside, recently I've been a little ambivalent about hammered fenders. I was starting to think that maybe the look was a little overdone or a bit gratuitous. But this bike has rekindled my interest in these to the point that I'm starting to think that a set could look pretty nice on my new Fuji America.

I have a question about this frame. From the classicfuji.com catalogs, I can't find a series IV with the mid-fork mounts. The Series V has mid-fork mounts in the 84,85, 86 catalogs available, yet yours is indeed a series IV, at least that is what the decals indicate. Any ideas?

Hi, I am the owner of this bike, and I've noticed that too. I wonder if it was supposed to be a V, and got painted as a IV at the factory? I have seen some with clamp-on cable stops, and others with shifter bosses. Some with a pump peg, and some without. Seems like a crapshoot to me.

A repainted Fuji Touring Series iv or v (mid-fork mounts, downtube shifter booses) found its way into my bike shed. Plan is to use modern components for the build. Having trouble finding canti brakes to work with 700C wheels. What brake and rim/rim-width did you use? Did you use long-pull brake levers?